Ex-Mozilla CTO: I was grilled for three hours at US airport by border cops

Some discussion from yesterday: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=19558161" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=19558161</a><p>See also Andreas Gal&#x27;s blog post <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;medium.com&#x2F;@andreasgal&#x2F;no-one-should-have-to-travel-in-fear-b2bff4c460e5" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;medium.com&#x2F;@andreasgal&#x2F;no-one-should-have-to-travel-...</a> , the ACLU&#x27;s press release <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.aclunc.org&#x2F;news&#x2F;aclu-files-complaint-department-homeland-security-over-unwarranted-interrogation-and-attempted" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.aclunc.org&#x2F;news&#x2F;aclu-files-complaint-department-...</a> , and the ACLU&#x27;s formal complaint <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.aclunc.org&#x2F;docs&#x2F;ACLU-NC_2019-03-28_Letter_re._Electronic_Device_Search_SFO.pdf" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.aclunc.org&#x2F;docs&#x2F;ACLU-NC_2019-03-28_Letter_re._El...</a> .

Quick reminder: US citizens have an absolute right to reenter the country. Customs can temporarily detain you, but they cannot refuse entry. Any threat, whether implied or stated, that they will hold you until you unlock your device is not real. They <i>can</i> hold your stuff indefinitely, so be prepared to lose it if you go this route, but never unlock your device based on the idea that it’s the only way to go free.<p>Non-citizens are in a totally different boat. You can be denied entry for any reason whatsoever. Tread carefully....

<i>&quot;...he clammed up, taking the Fifth, and citing constitutional rights against unwarranted searches.<p>...border agents told him he had no constitutional nor any legal protections, and threatened him with criminal charges should he not concede to the search.<p>...he was eventually allowed to leave with his belongings, the devices still locked, and no charges were pressed.&quot;</i><p>My goodness! I guess those protections did exit after all! :)<p>Guidelines:<p>-Goons can lie to you all they want. Never budge.<p>-Politely refuse, and remain cordial. Stay strong mentally.<p>-Make sure your devices are turned off prior to even leaving for the airport.<p><i>This is the sick reality we live in.</i>

Traveling internationally with encrypted data you don&#x27;t want to disclose to border officials is not a good plan these days. Much safer to transfer securely via network connection.<p>It&#x27;s easy to single out the US but the reality is that most countries have pretty far reaching rules these days. E.g. the UK and Australia are hardly any safer. And forget about China, Russia, or indeed most countries with even less democratic regimes.<p>The bottom line is that if you are not willing to unlock your device at any of the security checkpoints you will pass on your journey, you should leave it at home or just wipe it preemptively and restore over a secure connection after you arrive. In case it does get unlocked or taken from you, consider the device burned. It may come back to you with all sorts of malware. The people doing this are not thinking you are a terrorist or a child pornographer: you are being targeted and under attack by a hostile entity. Assuming otherwise would be a mistake. Wipe it, sell it on e-bay, never use it again.

This assumes that he was not picked by random but instead there is some sort of list of people to check at airports that you can be put on because of your work within IT-security.<p>That would be a big story if that is the case.<p>I will offer a counter-narrative which is more in line with my own experience (from other places than the US):<p>The people who work at border control in particular in airports are bored.<p>They are also overstaffed and given extreme discretion over the people they patrol; most of whom are non-citizen and thus have basically no rights at all.<p>This leads to them doing work for the sake of showing they work, overreacting to the least of resistance and maybe even some games of entertainment.

I was once randomly selected for screening at Chicago Midway, that quickly became shockingly specific: &quot;Do you know that professor at DePaul that teaches Python?&quot; &quot;Do you mean Massimo Di Pierro?&quot; &quot;Yeah, I think that was his name.&quot; &quot;I&#x27;ve met him a few times...&quot; At this point it all seems very surreal. &quot;He was through here a few weeks ago and had stickers on his laptop that were like yours.&quot; Ooooh...

I&#x27;m hoping that manufactures will start building a plausible deniability user profile you can log into while leaving your actual profile encrypted, appearing to be slack space.<p>This kind of thuggery seems to be getting more common.

&gt; Gal said the agents did take away his Global Entry pass, which allows express entry through customs, as punishment for not complying with their demands.<p>I wonder about the legality of the CBP punitively confiscating his Global Entry pass.

The message it sends to me is, never visit America. I appreciate horrible things likely happen in my own country, but this is just disgusting.

The process is the punishment, and they know it. The current state is as exactly predicted by those of us who were against creating the TSA in the first place.

I&#x27;ll never forget how I was strip searched coming back from Costa Rica. They went through every photo in my digital camera, ripped open all of my packaged food items, made little snide remarks to me, and ultimately made me miss my connecting flight. The whole time I was fully cooperative.<p>Only explanation I have for the level of examination is maybe because I was a young minority returning from a random latin american country solo(?)

Even as a US citizen, at this point, it is my policy to never leave the country with a device &amp; set of data that I wouldn&#x27;t mind losing at customs.<p>Even though I have an essentially absolute right to re-enter the country, my hardware apparently does not, at least without potentially being detained for an extended period.<p>So, burner phone and pre-wiped laptop if I need it, all powered down. If I need any files while away, store them in a secure Box or other account before crossing borders.<p>At this point, it seems like just a necessary evil extra expense in time and money, and a good idea for other countries, although it sadly seems that the US is now the fast follower of Russia, China, etc, in terms of repressive practices.

If you&#x27;re being investigated, and they have emails sent to a domain you own (for example), then search your device, but you&#x27;ve given them a burner device with no reference to that email account, would that be considered &#x27;hiding&#x27; evidence?

It was my understanding that 5-th amendment protections against unreasonable searches are suspended at the border. That would certainly include customs at the airport.<p>So, in a strict legal sense, demanding to unlock a device does not violate the 5th.

Something relevant from the creator of cock.li <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;vc.gg&#x2F;blog&#x2F;so-its-been-a-while.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;vc.gg&#x2F;blog&#x2F;so-its-been-a-while.html</a>

Abuse of power, indeed -- but he should have let Apple&#x27;s lawyers sort out the proprietary device access issue after the fact. Pretty sure as Google employees the advice to us is to cooperate fully and then make sure lawyers know about it later. It&#x27;s not worth compromising your own security and freedom on behalf of a corporation.

speaking as an american, even on domestic flights it doesnt get any easier. I was once detained 45 minutes by the TSA for a laptop with a missing DVD drive. i bought it without the drive from a pawn shop to learn Arch linux on, and kept it because it was fast. I refused to unlock it.<p>since the RealID act was passed, and im too lazy to wait at the DMV for a compliant license, I just take my passport with me for ID on domestic flights. This once cost me 30 minutes with the TSA, again, explaining why I was using a passport for a domestic flight. I refused search, refused to cooperate, and was let on the plane.<p>security theater was fun 15 years ago but this shit show has gotten a little old. the oxycodone epidemic kills more americans than terrorism. Hell, lightning kills more americans than Al Qaeda.<p>shoes and belts off, shuffling through the checkpoints like juden at dachau, is degrading.

Original source: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;medium.com&#x2F;@andreasgal&#x2F;no-one-should-have-to-travel-in-fear-b2bff4c460e5" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;medium.com&#x2F;@andreasgal&#x2F;no-one-should-have-to-travel-...</a>

If another country were plan well, they could create opportunities that would attract and welcome the smart people from the US and elsewhere. If they made it economically attractive to tech businesses, they could set themselves up as a dominant leader of the world within 20-30 years, regardless of their current size.<p>I don&#x27;t know enough about Estonia to suggest they would try this, but they do seem progressive in this regard. I would vote for Netherlands, Belgium, or Portugal just because I like being in those countries.

This is why i&#x27;m so excited for the Librem smartphone. If i&#x27;m in complete control of the operating system, I can put measures in place to combat this. For example, a function that requires a password whenever the phone leaves a certain location (so if the police confiscate my phone, i&#x27;m sure it&#x27;s locked).<p>Or maybe a function that you can activate that makes the phone appear bricked until the power button is pushed 20 times in a row. You could activate this before going through customs.

Lets say he was flagged because of being vocal against the current administration; how do you think the incentive structure works for something like this to be executed? The president says I don’t like my critics. The person heading the CBP thinks they can get promoted if they show results on harassing critics. So they push that down as a goal...and somewhere a few weeks later agents on the ground actually take this up as a task to execute. Is that a realistic understanding?

It would be nice if phone and laptops had removable batteries, so we literally could not turn them on until we got to our destination and buy a new battery.

If most people told their boss exactly what they thought, they&#x27;d get a much worse punishment than a few measly hours of interrogation... At least this guy can go cry in his Mercedes Benz afterwards. It may not be fair but it&#x27;s not a problem that deserves news coverage IMO. I bet that much worse things have happened today which deserve more attention.

Knowing what we know it astonishes me that people take devices with anything of value over an international border.<p>Save everything to the cloud, or use a burner device like a It’s not worth the hassle.<p>(And yes, I’ve read that this antagonizes border security to a certain extent, if they believe you’ve done just this.)

In my country just refusing to unlock your phone instantly labels you as a terrorist (coup organiser)<p>We did got past all of those (!)<p>Ps. I live in Turkey

How do multi-account devices fare under these rules? What if I only have access to account A and not account B?<p>What if unlocking the device requires a security key that I do not have with me?<p>My intuition is that they&#x27;d still treat that as though I was impeding their search, but I wonder legally if it changes anything.

This is a good time to review the guide provided by the EFF:<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.eff.org&#x2F;wp&#x2F;digital-privacy-us-border-2017" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.eff.org&#x2F;wp&#x2F;digital-privacy-us-border-2017</a>

They are also cancelling ESTA for security professionals without warning and the resulting visa application gets stuck in administrative processing for months due to a security flag.

I think this would be a good opportunity for Apple&#x27;s legal department to do something. Maybe help the ACLU with it&#x27;s case against the Department of Homeland security.

Dupe: <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=19558161" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=19558161</a>

Perhaps this is very cynical, but shouldn&#x27;t they also be able to use airport security camera footage to figure out passwords?

Honestly this is one of the best use cases for multiple profiles on a device.<p>They want entrance, just grant it to a sandboxed environment.

Chilling, and Kafka-esque. As it happens I&#x27;m not convinced that the reason for his being detained had anything to do with him being a Trump critic and Democrat donor, contrary to his claims in the article, but more likely it&#x27;s some lifeless bureaucrat&#x2F;computer program or both putting a red flag on his file for some esoteric reason, very possibly connected to his work and writings on online privacy.<p>The lack of transparency on the reasons for detention are the real problem. Josef K never found out the charge made against him either.<p>(edit -spelling)

Hmmm it&#x27;s almost as if the land of the free has some sort of social credit score program?

I prefer increased crime over dealing with shit like this.

I love the creative writing and entitlement that comes through when someone has been wronged.<p>&gt; Ex-Mozilla CTO<p>Has no more or less rights than anyone else.<p>&gt; Techie says he was grilled for three hours<p>Clearly click bait &#x27;grilled for three hours&#x27;. Not questioned but &#x27;grilled&#x27;.<p>&gt; &quot;There I quickly found myself surrounded by three armed agents wearing bullet proof vests.&quot;<p>So what? Of course they were armed. Of course they had bullet proof vests. The sole purpose of using words like that (by a writer) is to get the goat of anyone reading and have them all up in arms about INJUSTICE of one type or another.<p>&gt; They started to question me aggressively regarding my trip, my current employment, and my past work for Mozilla<p>What do you think? They should act like the concierge at the Four Seasons? Of course they are going to be aggressive. That&#x27;s law enforcement attitude and there is a purpose for doing so.<p>&gt; Given the devices were emblazoned with big red stickers reading &quot;PROPERTY OF APPLE. PROPRIETARY,&quot; and he had signed confidentially agreements with Cupertino, Gal said he asked for permission to call his bosses and&#x2F;or a lawyer to see if he would get into trouble by handing over access.<p>This is total BS. You don&#x27;t need your bosses agreement when a request is made from Law Enforcement at least not because you signed some NDA etc. Fine that he attempted and asked. But the reason is weak.<p>&gt; and threatened him with criminal charges should he not concede to the search<p>Cops are allowed to lie. Not sure what the story is with border agents but possibly the same. That is how they often get info.<p>&gt; &quot;My past work on encryption and online privacy is well documented, and so is my disapproval of the Trump administration and my history of significant campaign contributions to Democratic candidates,&quot;<p>He is living in fantasy land here if he thinks there is some list of people that are being targeted for that reason. Not that it could happen but highly unlikely. It would take an entire Nixonian operation to pull that off. I think more likely since he came from a former communist state his thinking goes to this type of paranoia.<p>&gt; Now, Gal has enlisted the help of the ACLU to probe into the brouhaha, and determine whether his civil rights were violated.<p>Yes everyone is looking either for more internet fame or a payout. Not sure why he needs to save the world and belabor the issue. Just move on and don&#x27;t waste time.<p>&gt; &quot;Furthermore, CBP’s policies lack protections for First Amendment rights by allowing interrogation and device searches that may be based on a traveler’s political beliefs, activism, nation of origin, or identity.&quot;<p>Sounds like typical ACLU behavior for more publicity to aid fund raising (story on 60 Minutes):<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.cbs.com&#x2F;shows&#x2F;60_minutes&#x2F;video&#x2F;cm_lFZDERHcELSPw2fEioYAgqbNOHU3t&#x2F;the-chairman-aclu-genetic-revolution&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.cbs.com&#x2F;shows&#x2F;60_minutes&#x2F;video&#x2F;cm_lFZDERHcELSPw2...</a><p>ACLU got into high gear over Trump and sends out letters literally trying to raise money (I received one) clearly mentioning in so many words to take Trump down. Not the same organization that it used to be. On the 60 Minutes story iirc a former head of ACLU was interviewed and bothered by the current behavior.

So really,<p>&quot;Apple employee gets mildly harassed at airport because of proprietary confidentially agreements&quot; with<p>&quot;A terrible, terrible tragedy, non US-citizen travellers agree&quot; as a byline.<p>The main thing of interest here would be that maybe Mozilla should employ better hiring practices.